A Letter to Mother Nature: a book review

One of the features of wunderground.com that I'm most proud of is one all of you can take credit for--our wunderphotos. Each day, users of the web site upload an average of 500 - 600 photos of some of the most beautiful and spectacular natural phenomena on the planet. We all share the same atmosphere, and one really gets a sense of that connection when we look at the wunderphotos, which come from every corner of the planet. Since 2003, 1.5 million wunderphotos have been uploaded, with over half a million just in the past three years. We have a dedicated team of volunteer reviewers that screen each photo, and I owe a big thank-you to all of you who have served as wunderphoto moderators. One of our most dedicated wunderphotographers, Lucy Woodley (wunderhandle: observing), was inspired to collect a set of 90 of her favorite wunderphotos and put them into a book. Her effort, A Letter to Mother Nature, was published this May. Each photo in the book has a sentence above it, poetically describing the scene below. It only takes a few minutes to whip through the book, but the spectacular images and thoughtful text invite one to linger longer and contemplate the natural beauty we are surrounded by. Here's a sampling of the text and images from the book, with wunderphotos by SunsetFL, CameraDiva, and Sharrose:

Dear Mother Nature,Quite simply, I am in aweof you and here is why...

You remind us to always look up...

...for there are great wonders overhead.

We can't resist dancing in your meadows.

A Letter to Mother Nature is $14.99 (paperback) from amazon.com. Proceeds from sale of the book go to support the disaster relief charity Portlight.org, founded by members of the wunderground community. I give A Letter to Mother Nature my highest rating, five out of five stars.

Rare transit of Venus todayI hope all you wunderphotographers will help document for us today a rare celestial happening--a transit of Venus across the sun. On June 5th at 3:09 pm PDT, Venus will begin a historic 7-hour transit of the solar disk, appearing as a dark spot against the sun's blazing face. This will be the last transit of Venus across the sun until 2117. As always, when viewing the sun, be sure to do it indirectly, or use a proper filter such as a #14 welder's glass to block the sun's eye-damaging rays. NASA.gov has more info. I'll link the best wunderphotographs taken of today's transit at the bottom of this post tonight and Wednesday morning. Below is one from Venus' last transit of the sun, back in 2004. Thanks, wunderphotographers!

Despite thick clouds we were able to capture a brief glimpse of the planet Venus transiting the Sun. This image was taken with a modern digital camera attached to the historic Ladd Observatory telescope (1891) The clouds thinned just enough to capture this one image at 6:21:38 PM EDT, just moments after second contact.

I used a first generation canon digital rebel, a 300mm telephoto lens, a circular polarizing filter, and the low atmosphere to capture this beautiful amateur photograph of Venus dotting the Sun's disc.

Quoting MississippiWx:Fairly broad area turning across the SW Gulf seen on visible and it shows up on the 850mb vort maps. There's another area in the convection in the Eastern Gulf. Once/if the shear clears out then that might be when we need to pay closer attention to the Gulf as persistent trofiness/lower pressures sit over the Gulf. Could be a classic setup for a homegrown system as high pressure builds in over the Northern states next week.

Quoting RitaEvac:Curious as to what the outflow boundary coming from Beaumont is going to do as it goes SW, will it do nothing, explode new storms over Chamber/Liberty counties, or blow up storms later on past Houston/Galveston and put us right in the dry slot

Strong enough to be a focus for some t-storms west/southwest of Houston tomorrow.

BAY AREA -- A line of storms has begun moving across Pinellas County from the Gulf of Mexico.

The storms could bring winds gusts of up to 20 mph and more heavy rain.

Earlier Wednesday, storm damage and flooding were reported in Hudson as thunderstorms moved across parts of the Bay area. Pasco County Fire Rescue responded to the Holy Ground Homeless Shelter shortly after 1:30 p.m. after a tree fell on a building.Parts of Bayshore Boulevard in Tampa were closed as normal low areas of the roadway flooded. The roadway has since been reopened.The latest forecast every 10 minutes with Weather on the NinesThe strongest storms moved through Pinellas, Manatee, Hillsborough and Polk Counties. According to Bay News 9 Meteorologist Josh Linker, thunderstorms from the Gulf of Mexico are moving onshore with heavy rain and some high winds.The storms are moving very quickly to the northeast.

"High pressure is south of our area, and a frontal boundary is dropping south toward North Florida with high rain chances for a couple of days,'' Linker said. "It will stay warm and muggy through the day and into tonight with chances of rain and thunderstorms throughout the day.''The wet conditions are likely to continue Thursday with high rain chances again.

Quoting centex:Dry slot is a term I've gotten all to familiar with. The early spring rains did help, keeping our temps down below 100, but we about to start summer really dry, May was a bust. After the spring rains my largest tree decided to die after starting to leaf out. Arborist tried to save it but now I need to pay a lot to get it removed. Lots of trees still dying, a delayed reaction from last years extreme drought. I was told to expect the die off for two years.

Quoting RitaEvac:Curious as to what the outflow boundary coming from Beaumont is going to do as it goes SW, will it do nothing, explode new storms over Chamber/Liberty counties, or blow up storms later on past Houston/Galveston and put us right in the dry slotLooking at the GOES composite, it does seem the moisture is moving West. Counterintuitive to most of us, but that's what I'm seeing.LCRA met Bob Rose said to expect nocturnal firing of storms, and you can see the high pressure over the western half of TX rapidly dissipating.

I sure would love to be ashamed of myself for jumping the gun earlier and calling the forecast for rain a despicable bust.

Quoting RitaEvac:Curious as to what the outflow boundary coming from Beaumont is going to do as it goes SW, will it do nothing, explode new storms over Chamber/Liberty counties, or blow up storms later on past Houston/Galveston and put us right in the dry slot

Dry slot is a term I've gotten all to familiar with. The early spring rains did help, keeping our temps down below 100, but we about to start summer really dry, May was a bust. After the spring rains my largest tree decided to die after starting to leaf out. Arborist tried to save it but now I need to pay a lot to get it removed. Lots of trees still dying, a delayed reaction from last years extreme drought. I was told to expect the die off for two years.

Fairly broad area turning across the SW Gulf seen on visible and it shows up on the 850mb vort maps. There's another area in the convection in the Eastern Gulf. Once/if the shear clears out then that might be when we need to pay closer attention to the Gulf as persistent trofiness/lower pressures sit over the Gulf. Could be a classic setup for a homegrown system as high pressure builds in over the Northern states next week.

Though, I'd say there's a fair chance that we'll get Chris around the 18th-20th.

Well the gfs and the ecmwf have been very consistent with development in the epac around the 14th-15th which looks to be at least partially a result of a wave currently off Africa reaching central America and helping to enhance convective activity along with the mjo. This wave could also get something get something going in the Atlantic although most models and ensemble runs don't show anything happening in the Atlantic until after the 16th or 17th. But yeah those sound like good dates and it looks like we have a good chance of seeing something sometime that week.